MBK: South Dakota Accepts Bid To CBI; Set To Host North Texas Wednesday

Vermillion, SD

The South Dakota men's basketball team will be in the postseason for the second-consecutive year after accepting a bid to the College Basketball Invitational. The Coyotes host North Texas at 7 p.m. Wednesday inside the Sanford Coyote Sports Center in Vermillion.

The bid to play in the CBI marks the third appearance in a postseason national tournament in the Division I era. Previously, USD played in the CollegeInsider.com Tournament in 2010 against Creighton and the NIT last season at Iowa.

The 2018 CBI has 16 teams in the single-elimination tournament. First round games take place Wednesday and Thursday with quarterfinal round contests taking place Monday, March 19. The semifinal round is Wednesday, March 21 and the tournament concludes with a best-of-three championship series beginning March 26.

South Dakota has tallied its most wins in the Division I era with 26, sitting just one shy of matching the school record of 27.

Led by first-team all-Summit League guard Matt Mooney, the Coyotes went 26-8 on the season and 11-3 in league action. Mooney tallied 18.6 points per game with Tyler Hagedorn adding 13.2 points per contest. Trey Burch-Manning owns a team-best 6.7 rebounds per game. Hagedorn and Burch-Manning each earned second-team all-Summit League accolades.

North Texas owns a 15-17 record and tallied an 8-10 record inside Conference USA. Sophomore guard Roosevelt Smart earned second-team all-Conference USA honors scoring 18.9 points per game. He was joined in double-digit scoring by fellow sophomore Ryan Woolridge who scored 13.3 points per game and freshman Umoja Gibson at 10.5 points per game.

The Mean Green placed seventh in C-USA, the highest finish in five seasons in the conference. In the first round of the C-USA Tournament, North Texas bowed out to Louisiana Tech 68-62.

Tickets are available at GoYotes.com, or by calling the USD ticket office at (605) 677-5959. Tickets range between $13-15 for adults and $7-8 for youth. Season ticket holders will have until Tuesday at 5 p.m. to claim their regular season seats for the postseason event. Any unclaimed season-ticket holder seats will be released to the public.